"What," said M. Peter in another part of his address, "do your microbes signify to me? There will but be one microbe the more.'

How did the great Pasteur and his satellites comport themselves under this? First rose M. Bouley-one of the satellites -whose competency M. Peter had gravely questioned, and he made this spirited reply: "He (M. Peter) finds me incompetent because he has not the competence sufficient to judge of my competence!" But hear the thunderer himself:

"And when," said M. Pasteur, "we are on the eve perhaps of solving the question of the etiology of this disease by the doctrine of microbes (la microbie). M. Peter commits the medical blasphemy of saying "What do your microbes signify to me? There will but be one microbe the more.”

The effect of this awful thunderclap is a little spoiled by the word "perhaps," as Dr. Piedvache points out, and it was quite unnecessary, as is seen from the following quotation from Pasteur's speech which Dr. Piedvache supplies:

"I tell speak

you,

in short, on the strength of a knowledge which permits me to

that it is strange that a professor of the first school of medicine in the world compares to a simple curiosity of natural history,' facts like those of the marvellous experiments of Pouilly-le-Fort :-a knowledge which permits me to denounce the levity with which you have spoken of vaccinations by attenuated viruses. And what is it that is at stake? It is a method of prophylaxis, certain and absolute, that is at stake. I repeat, certain and absolute."

This is more like the tone of a being who inhabits a region above the sphere of argument in which we lower mortals are compelled to dwell. Our only wonder is that M. Peter survived.

But typhoid fever was the subject of discussion, as Dr. Piedvache reminds us, and something, for appearance' sake, had to be done. "A committee has been named, and conclusions will be voted on grounds where, it is said, there is general agreement-hygiene." The following bit will not bear translating, and so we reproduce it in the original, as it is too good to be lost:- :-"C'est le cas de songer au 'desinit in piscem;' mais pour un poisson d'avril, tenez pour certain qu'il sent l'égout d'une lieue, et il sera surtout question d'égout dans les conclusions envoyées au ministre. Pouah!"

Speaking of the theories of Claude Bernard concerning hyper

pyrexia, and the fermentative theory of Brand, and consequent cold-water treatment, M. Peter remarked:

"His doctrine makes us dream; and we can fancy an Edison of the future inventing a machine furnished at one end with a thermometer, and with a cramp at the other; the thermometer should insinuate itself into the rectum, and whenever it accuses the patient of a temperature of 38·5° C. the cramp should seize him and plunge him into cold water. But do we

not see that if the morbid heat is a product of fermentation, and if the fermentation is the function of a living element, every disease with increased temperature is a disease with fermentation, and, in its kind, a disease of microbes ? Consequently phlegmasias and hyperthermic diseases become diseases of microbes. Thus pneumonia, pleurisy, pericarditis; thus rheumatism and all hyperthermic diseases are infectious diseases. All should therefore be treated alike, (1) by cold, which arrests fermentation, or (2) by a parasiticide, which will kill the microbe."

Dr. Piedvache concludes his article as follows:

The

"One quotation from M. Bouley and we have done. treatments in vogue in typhoid fever rest absolutely on one uniform formula, and the doctors of Lyons accommodate themselves marvellously to the mathematics of the method of Brand. But M. Bouley, who would, if necessary, have invented paradox, who is paradox incarnate, gives us yet one surprise more, innocents that we are. On the 17th of April he expressed himself to this effect:

"No treatment of typhoid fever individualises more than that of Brand (who would have thought it ?). Treating all diseases by cold water is not treating them all in the same manner. Between the bath of five minutes and the bath of fifteen minutes; between the bath of 28° and that of 17°; between affusion and the bath, there is at least as much difference as between sulphate of quinine and alcohol.

"We beg pardon, M. Bouley, what varies here is the dose, and not the mode of treatment. But the continuation of the quotation goes to show on what ground the paradox rests, on an exceedingly amusing hypothesis, that of a normal typhoid fever!

. . If there is a schematic formula it is for treating normal typhoid fever-that, for example, which we treat from the beginning (these then are the cases which are normal)."

"It would be permissible to call this language juggling with words. Let us always hold to the word 'individualisation,' which is beginning to have a normal currency in the academies. Every bad case being deniable they will maintain that the word

was not taken from us, although it was created by the homoeopaths. Without pretending that the academicians are never capable of abusing it as well as our humblest 'pures,' let us wait till we some day see in La Rue des Saint Pères the treatment of the name contending with absolute individualisation, and we can then promise ourselves some merry moments."

Microbes not the Cause of Disease.

"I separate, by means of a parchment membrane, blood from water containing the salts that promote the development of protoorganisms. The whole is placed in the conditions that render the blood septicemic. After some time we find in both the liquids absolutely the same inferior organisms, the same vibriones, the same bacteria, the same microbes, and yet, while a few drops of the blood cause death, we may inject quantities of the water and consequently introduce thousands of proto-organisms identical as to form, age, &c., into the organism, without causing the least disturbance." (Onimus, Gaz. Méd. Dec. 30, 1882).

A Homœopathic Dog.

MANY are the remarkable instances that have come under observation in connection with the canine family. Here is one. A black retriever dog was one morning lately found waiting patiently for admission to the Homœopathic Dispensary, South Tay-street, Dundee. On the door being opened the animal walked inside, limping on three feet, and, entering the waitingroom, lay down on his right side, and held up the left hind foot, which was found to be so dreadfully crushed that part of it was hanging off, exposing the bone. Dr. Howieson dressed the dog's limb, and notwithstanding the pain caused during the process the animal gave not a whine, but held his foot perfectly still, and ever and anon licked the doctor's hand by way of recognition of and gratitude at his services. The dog returned daily for some time and had his foot dressed, often waiting alone before the door was opened; but one evening he returned to have the morning dressing removed, it being of a rather painful kind, and when

bandages were again applied he refused to allow them to remain, but limped away and never again returned. On one occasion he had been taken to Dr. Howieson's house, and on Sunday when the dispensary was closed, he went there.-(Land and Water, June 23rd, 1883).

Tincture Triturations.

To the Editors of the British Quarterly Journal of Homœopathy. GENTLEMEN,-On page 39 of the new British Homœopathic Pharmacopoeia directions are given for preparing tincture triturations, viz. by adding 960 minims of the tincture (usually the mother tincture) to 960 grains of Sugar of Milk, and when dry the whole is to be weighed and made up to 960 grains by the addition of more Sugar of Milk. Then follows:-"From the way it is made it will be obvious that one grain of a tincture trituration will contain as much of the medicine as one minim of the tincture itself." Now, if mother tincture is used it will necessarily increase the weight so that the product will weigh more than 960 grains. Take, for example, Nux vomica, and it will be found to increase the weight by about twelve grains owing to the extractive matter contained in the tincture; with others it would be more or less in proportion to the matter in solution. The correct way would be to take a less quantity of Sugar of Milk, say 900 grains, mix with the tincture, and when dry make the whole up to 960 grains. This will then represent one minim in one grain.

I am, gentlemen,

74, New Bond Street,

London.

Yours very truly,

L. T. ASHWELL.

British Homoeopathic Pharmacopoeia.

WE are requested by Dr. Drury to call attention to the fol lowing correction he wishes to be made in the last edition of the above work.

Page 39, line 10 from top, after "2 ounces erase "and 85 grains."

315

OBITUARY.

DR. FRANCIS BLACK.

FOR forty-two years the name of our deceased colleague has been a household word in connection with the history of homoeopathy in Britain. He studied homoeopathy in Paris in 1840 under Hahnemann. In 1841 he and Dr. Rutherfurd Russell set up the first homeopathic dispensary in Edinburgh-probably the first in Britain-and in doing so threw down the gauntlet to old physic. The latter was only too willing to take it up, and a long and bitter persecution of homoeopathy commenced in Edinburgh, the effects of which are still noticeable among the medical profession in that city, as we have lately seen in the antihomœopathic zeal of one of the professors of the Edinburgh University, when he elected to give the southern metropolis the benefit of his surgical skill, and astonished his more liberal surgical colleagues by refusing to do his surgical work while the ordinary medical attendant, a partisan of homoeopathy, who had called him in to the case, continued to visit the patient, though without prescribing for him.

The College of Physicians of Edinburgh refused their Fellowship to Dr. Black on the ground of his homœopathic proclivities, the first time that such a refusal had been made on the ground of difference of therapeutic views between college and candidate.

In 1843 Dr. Black joined Drs. Drysdale and Russell in establishing the British Journal of Homœopathy, and though Dr. Black's editorial connection with our periodical ceased with the first volume, he continued to contribute valuable articles to our columns up to the last year of his life, and up to our last volume.

He did not remain long in Edinburgh to battle against the mighty forces of orthodox physic, but was compelled by the health of one of his family to exchange the rigour of Scotch